Film reviews: I Want Your Sex | Colony
Olivia Wilde gives a hilariously outré performance as a predatory artist in Gregg Araki’s raunchy farce I Want Your Sex, writes Alistair Harkness
I Want Your Sex (18) ★★★★
Colony (15) ★★★★
Having directed and starred in this summer’s The Invite (one of the films of the year so far), Olivia Wilde is having a bit of moment, and she keeps the momentum going with a hilariously outré turn as a predatory artist in Gregg Araki’s raunchy farce I Want Your Sex. Presumably named for the George Michael song, and shot at times like high-gloss 1980s-style psycho thriller, the film kicks off with a naked body floating face-down in a pool, Sunset Boulevard-style, before rewinding 9½ weeks (winking reference very much intended) to detail how it got there. The body belongs to Wilde’s Erika Tracy, a sex-obsessed provocateur whose explicit art is part transgressive desire to expand the possibilities of the form, part cynical exercise in managing her brand, part Warholian experiment in taking collectors who don’t know anything for a ride.
She tells all this to her new assistant, Elliot (Cooper Hoffman), sensing in him a desperation to unleash his own sexuality in a way that he’s not been able to with his own studious – and sex-averse – girlfriend Minerva (in a droll bit of counter-casting, she’s played by the pop-star Charli XCX). The moment Elliot signs his NDA, though, it’s pretty much off to the races as he submits to Erika’s kinky, worldly, sex-positive (and sometimes sex-negative) approach to life by becoming her willing plaything.
Araki – who spearheaded the queer cinema movement of the 1990s – revels in the absurdity of Elliot and Erika’s sub/dom relationship, but finds moments of tenderness and poignancy too, as in the moment when Elliot invites his female flatmate (Chase Sui Wonders) to participate in their antics one night and everything gets uncomfortably real. Mostly, though, it’s an absolute hoot, with Wilde embracing Erika’s sociopathic desire to get her freak on, and Hoffman throwing himself into his role with admirable abandon.
Like the recent 28 Years Later movies, South Korean bio-horror Colony injects some energy back into the zombie film with some small tweaks to the genre that yield impressive results. The latest film from Train to Busan director Yeon Sang-ho, its viral outbreak – in the midst of a bioengineering conference that leads to a building being locked down, Die Hard-style – may revolve around a Last of Us-esque zombie hive-mind in which the newly infected evolve as one, but the creepy way they move (like break-dancing flash-mobs), and the ruthlessness with which Yeon approaches his characters (let’s just say that no good deed goes unpunished), gives the intense action a welcome edge.
Both films in cinemas from 28 August
The Scotsman’s arts newsletter is now sent twice a week - subscribe today
Enjoying the Arts & Culture journalism on scotsman.com? Make it easier to find by selecting us as a preferred Google source
Want the latest Scottish headlines sent directly to your phone? Sign up to our new WhatsApp channel here
Comments
Want to join the conversation? Please or to comment on this article.